”America’s welcome does not extend to immigrants who come here to commit crimes,” she said in a statement. “ICE will leave no stone unturned in hunting down and deporting aliens who victimize our communities.”

The crackdown will probably generate the kind of headlines the Bush administration is looking for…

Agents Round Up More than 2,100 Criminal Aliens.

Nationwide Operation Nets Thousands of Fugitives.

The government also gave the round-up the requisite authoritative-sounding tag: Operation Return to Sender.

And Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff supplied the quotes, calling it “another example of a new and tough interior enforcement strategy that seeks to catch and deport criminal aliens.”

But I wonder if it means all that much. And I ask myself these operations are a bit misleading, giving people the illusion that the government might be getting the country’s immigration problems under control.

By the federal government’s own admission, more than 590,000 immigrants are “fugitives from the immigration system.” Federal agents have no idea where they are. They’ve overstayed their visas and changed addresses. They’ve failed to appear in court. And the number of “immigration fugitives” is increasing at a rate of more than 40,000 per year, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

So 2,100 people captured and accounted for is a drop in the bucket.

I’m not criticizing the government for enforcing the law. But the timing — with the round-up announced as Washington debates an overhaul of immigration laws — seems suspicious.

For the record, 424 of the fugitives were captured in Texas, including 120 in Houston.

Of the 2,179 arrested nationwide, the government said about half had criminal records.

A few other numbers:

146 had convictions for sexual offenses involving minors.

367 were members or associates of street gangs.

640 disappeared after being issued orders to leave the country.

Most of the fugitives weren’t hard-core criminals and were picked up on administrative violations. (That probably won’t be in any headlines). And a big share of those — 829 — have already been deported.